


Raising Hell

by OrbitWhite



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Afterlife, Death, F/F, Foul Language, Heaven/Hell, Heavy Themes, Humanstuck, Lesbian pairing, Multi, Religion, Suicide
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2012-03-11
Updated: 2012-03-31
Packaged: 2017-11-01 19:41:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 3
Words: 8,379
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/360506
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/OrbitWhite/pseuds/OrbitWhite
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>(Humanstuck.)<br/>Vriska Serket is about to break into Heaven and steal away her dearly beloved; the problem is that she has to get through Hell first. Based on a pariahpirate prompt in the Kink meme.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Of Connections And Puns

**Author's Note:**

> Just a fair warning, but as of now, there are three planned chapters of setup. I mean, it's hard to believe someone will go through hell for someone else without seeing why. There's a reason for everything - including prose and references - and I'll post some backstory on my livejournal once the first chunk is out of the way.  
> Response to:  
> http://homesmut.livejournal.com/15949.html?thread=31739213#t31739213
> 
> P.S., the chapters might be a bit short; I've grown too used to writing short scenes.

Life, as this young woman knew it, could be a bitch. 

"As delicious as your desperate offer is, Blueberry, I'm a law student. I can barely afford the cherry on this sundae, and it's the only tasty thing I've had for months, there's no way I could spew out rent like that." 

Vriska Serket. Twenty four, between jobs and short a roommate to pay rent. In a word: fucked. 

"Nepeta doesn't charge you?" She asked, surprised and a little angry. And, maybe, a little jealous. 

"Kitty gives me a discount," Terezi said, pursing her lips with a wrinkle of her nose. The stray bit of chocolate at the corner of her mouth was licked away - a flicker of her long tongue - and for a moment she seemed to look at the remains of her dessert mournfully. "Every Saturday, the stars align, and I keep trying to roll a legislacerator but they keep telling me it doesn't exist. One day, Blueberry. One day I'll show them." 

"What the fuck is a legislacerator?" 

The blind woman reached across the table, brow furrowed deeply, and after an initial miss she placed a hand upon Vriska's shoulder and squeezed. "If I ever told you," she intoned, "I'd have to kill you." 

Vriska brushed the hand away. "Awesome. It'd save me the trouble of dealing with this shit." She sighed, and her shoulders dropped. "I have none of the luck, 'rezi, none of it." 

That long tongue was dragging along her cheek the moment after she said it, despite leaning back as far as the squishy cushion of the booth would allow, and Terezi settled back into her seat with crossed legs and a predator's grin. 

"Your tears are salty and unpleasant, Blueberry." 

"I wasn't crying, you unbelievable creep." 

This was measured with the sort of thoughtfulness that seemed far too deliberate; delicate fingers on a pointed chin, a hum that stretched on for a full five seconds. Overdramatics. 

"I guess that's just you, then."

"Fuck off." 

\-- 

Oh what tangled webs we weave... 

Things have a funny way of being connected, and stories usually have a funny way of having the most interesting connections. But, it should be pointed out, it wouldn't be a Story if it were any other way; it would be life. 

As it would turn out, Vriska's soon-to-be-ex-roommate was one Jake English. Jake's grandmother was growing ill, though there were some unfortunate implications mentioned regarding Betty Crocker, and the responsible young lad was moving back to take care of her as soon as he could. Unfortunately for Vriska, he couldn't wait forever. 

Now, the connection is in one Dirk Strider. Tenuous, at times, for it seems that Jake is constantly surrounded by the sort of drama most typically found in a soap opera, but a connection nonetheless. From there, the connection would spread, for Dirk was related to one Rose Lalonde. 

And Rose... 

...Rose's connection was with one Kanaya Maryam, and this connection would be the one that mattered the most in these degrees of separation. 

\-- 

Life, as this young woman knew it, could be better. 

But, well, it could be worse as well. 

"Really, you don't need to fret over this. We have plenty of room to spare. I completely expected this to be difficult, and I will not simply decide that enough is enough. Take your time." 

Kanaya Maryam. Twenty six, in debt for a currently useless fashion degree, and mooching off of her friends. In a word? Uncomfortable. 

"Really," she insisted in return, putting special emphasis on the word. Well, more special than usual, anyway. "If I could just help out somehow, I'd at least feel like less of a leech." 

Rose stared her down, and she wilted, guilty despite herself. Yes, a friend was still a friend regardless of embarrassingly rejected advances in recent history, but after asking so much it was a little confusing to have remained on such good terms. Stares like that didn't help things. Stares like that were sending mixed signals she was reasonably certain weren't intended. 

"Kanaya," she said, softening somewhat. "Leeches are - in my humble opinion - unwelcome, wriggling things that tend to trigger one's primal urge to shriek in terror and run the other way. You are a wonderful young woman that I love as much as I can," a wince, "and I am wasting no effort in allowing you to take a room in my house that would otherwise remain unused and useless." 

"But-" 

"No. Be quiet. You would rather be independant, I understand, and it's not exactly a secret that you would also rather avoid any lingering awkwardness between us. Yes, that was in fact painfully obvious. But you know that some things require patience, and you should be aware that I also possess this knowledge as well as an almost infinite supply of the required patience. You've heard the stories of my mother, Kanaya, you know that I have remained stoic in the face of things that would drive lesser individuals mad. This is nothing dramatic, problematic, or otherwise some form of grievance that presumably rhymes with either." 

Rose was silent, then, and it took Kanaya a moment to realize that she was finished talking. Slowly, she smiled, and while it was a tentative and uncertain thing ...it was a start. 

"Traumatic," a new voice broke in. Dirk tilted his somewhat ridiculous shades downward, giving them both a pointed Strider Stare. "You were looking for an appropriate rhyme," he explained. "Traumatic fits the bill." 

Rose was unamused. 

"I have more, if you don't like it. Climactic is a bit off, but fitting, and erratic is always a good choice." 

"You are not as funny as you would like to believe." 

"And, if you wanted something more meta, you could have gone with thematic, but that's always risky." 

"Dirk!"


	2. Of Dresses and Kisses

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A breezy look through the life and times of Vriska Serket and Kanaya Maryam. 
> 
> Warning: teeth-meltingly sappy.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Holy crap this chapter is so much longer than the first one. I just sort of started writing and I couldn't stop. I COULDN'T STOP YOU GUYS. 
> 
> Okay so yeah there's one more chapter to go before we get this party started. For those of you who are curious as to unmentioned details, or confused about minor background points/events (Vriska's job for instance), I wrote up some backstory. 
> 
> http://orbitwhite.livejournal.com/3214.html

The connections begin to spread and interweave. In the end, it's Jake that sets up the meeting. He's sheepish as he tells Vriska about it, and a bit evasive when she questions him on why. When he tells her that the meeting is with Dirk, she understands a little; it must have been fiercely awkward to arrange. She doesn't say it, but she appreciates the effort. Actually meeting the friend of a friend of a friend would have been better, and less like playing Telephone, but she plays along. 

Irritably, of course, but she still plays along. 

It's a quick lunch, and the first thing Vriska does is to compliment his hair. (It was either that or his shades.) He doesn't reciprocate the sentiment one way or another, to her further annoyance, nor does he bother to correct her when she 'accidentally' calls him Dick. Instead, when his last name comes into question and she is a half second away from making a terribly crass joke, he smoothly tells her to run away with the name. 

Right down the aisle if she'd like. 

Vriska has met her match and she does not like it. 

Despite this, the formalities go by quickly, and another meeting is set up. Surprised, still seething, but far too desperate to care about her feelings, she agrees. 

The new place is expensive, and she has to bow to the douchebaggery that had to take, but she is only partway through plans of phallic meals to bitterly stab with her fork when she sees the woman he is with and she immediately thinks that this will be worth it. She has only seen two Silent Films, and she has only seen old women who looked like they belonged in them (once upon a time), but from one glance she knows that this woman is a Vintage Catch and she feels like pitching tonight. 

And now she sounds like Strider. God damn it. 

She shoves past the waiter and takes her seat with all the arrogance of someone who gives no fucks about her frayed jeans and cheap shoes. She doesn't take off her jacket, or greet Douchebag, or bother to introduce herself. (Yet.) 

Instead, she looks the woman right in the eyes - green, she notices - and says, "Hello, beautiful." She smiles her favorite smile, the one that has a secret and charms the world in a heartbeat. "Dick told me you're on the market for an apartment." 

That the woman has the grace to blush is no surprise, but she recovers fairly quickly. Vriska is spellbound. 

"His name is Dirk," she corrects with particular care, smoothing invisible wrinkles in her skirt and giving him a Look. How precious. "And he told me plenty about you." 

Vriska's smile stretches into a grin, the one that shares too much. She dives through the distance the woman has created, leaning forward just a fraction. "Not enough," she whispers conspiratorially. 

And when the waiter arrives, and she orders the Rocky Mountain Oysters, she is pleased to draw out what is half a laugh from Douchebag. That it's also half a scoff is just icing on the cake. 

\-- 

Sometime in the not so distant past, one Kanaya Maryam was hearing news from one Dirk Strider. She is, on the one hand, perplexed; this is just shy of "out of his way" territory, and she would have been perfectly capable of meeting with this woman to begin with. (On the other hand, she is excited and a bit too hopeful, because being self sufficient again would be incredible.) 

He dismisses it on the grounds that he owed Jake a favor, and says nothing on the matter of Kanaya handling it herself. She smiles as he carries on to make half-hearted references to abusive relationships, and she doesn't criticize him for any of it. He becomes a hurricane of words and allusions backed by a muted and disinterested delivery, and she is not sure which to believe; the derision, or the praise. 

"If you dislike her," Kanaya interjects, pointedly raising a brow, "why consider meeting her again?" 

The slightest of double takes. He actually turns his head to face her. 

"I don't dislike her." 

She laughs, then, thinking that she knows what to expect. She is wrong, because there is no expecting what she gets, but she knows what it means when she hears that Jake trusted this woman - Jake, who is gone, and at least one soul wanted for him to stay more than they'd ever admit - and she knows what it means that he doesn't resent her for that. 

What she gets is a disaster waiting to happen. What she gets is a woman she could only think to describe as "sharp," riding on the fine edge of a storm with all the danger of a trapped animal in a world of lemmings. The smile is the hardest part to witness, because here is someone who knows what they are capable of, and only just now have they seen the stars. 

But Kanaya does not leave. She lets it play out, because she believes in the trust of her friends (and their friends, to an extent). Because she is drawn to the damaged and lonely. Because, to an extent, she hopes for this to work; she hopes that she won't have to rely on courtesies any longer. She hopes, and she lets herself hope, thinking that it's okay. That she can handle this. 

Because, for all that Vriska Serket is dangerous, she has it on good authority that she is not half as bad as she would like to appear. 

She has a lot to discuss with Rose. 

\-- 

What was initially meant to be a look became a deal. Finances had been discussed early on, and the both of them were taking something of a mutual risk - in some ways, because Vriska had far less options at the time, it was Kanaya who had the safer end of the deal. It was smaller than she had grown accustomed to, but that it was hers was a comfort all on its own. 

And, to start, it was awkward; for the most part, it was the usual attempts to be friendly despite drastic differences in personality, and it did not mix well with being on one's best behavior to impress the Other Girl. Vriska tried too hard to keep absurdly clean, instead making it obvious how unused to it she was; Kanaya was all stiff smiles and gestures to help, as if not doing so would ruin the delicate balance. 

They walked on eggshells. 

But, the first deadline for rent came and went without issue, and the guillotine was off their necks. They had actual conversations. 

Kind of. 

"You have a bus pass?" Surprise. Expectant curiosity.  
"Yes." Hesitance. Anxious recollection. "I don't do well with driving."  
Recognition. Attempted olive branch. "Want to ride a motorcycle?" Eagerness.  
Ghost of a heart attack. "...no thank you."

In a way, it's security that they establish first; their differences are numerous and vast, but there is a comfort in their routine. A comfort in their respective lives being tied together. They learn things, and they adapt. Put simply, they grow. 

It's the little things that keep happening; gestures that don't mean much on their own, but put together paint a bigger picture that neither of them fully grasp for a long time. Vriska, the tightly wound wire that could cut those who aren't privvy to its bite; Kanaya, the soft and enduring force with a dream, unexplainable for those who are blind to reading between the layered lines. One is the loud and volatile strength that you never expect to fall, but the one you expect to crack; the other is the quiet Lady you think will remain static forever, and the one you wouldn't look to for a spine. 

Most of these expectations are horribly presumptous and wholly incorrect. 

Kanaya is rarely home in the evenings, but half the time will bring back leftovers from the place she waits tables at because she knows that Vriska is too lazy to cook. (For her part, she has figured out that no one could be as bad as Vriska PRETENDS to be to avoid it and justify microwaved leftover chili-in-a-can. Or at least, she hopes as much.) During the day, the sun streaks through her room's open windows, a comfort she feels is too often taken for granted. Its warmth soaks the overwhelming amount of fabric she has to work with, and she feels a little less foolish for it as it slips through her fingers. 

She is content, and growing to be almost unreasonably happy. 

For her part, Vriska is not usually the type to do things for other people; she takes the more solitary route where, if she wants to be nice to someone, she stays out of their way. At least, it seemed nice before. She makes a goddamn living off of laughing in the face of traffic and crowds, and her downtime isn't much better. It's a genuine favor to the world if she stays home with a bowl of shrimp ramen and hours of cat videos on Youtube. It's an effort to be conscious of someone else, let alone their feelings; Kanaya makes this attitude difficult to justify without feeling like a jerk. 

So it's a Tuesday, two months into their arrangement, that she buys a chocolate cake and one of those squeeze bottles of green icing. It's not a perfect color match, but it's close enough. 

She starts out with too-large letters. "2 months anvrsy" is all she has room to write, and she feels like a champ for managing that much. Kanaya smiles at it; it's a little crooked from withheld laughter, but it's a start. 

Vriska is almost immediately one-upped, as not even a week later she finds a fancy blue shirt hanging from her door. It fits. 

Challenge Accepted, she thinks, and the next month becomes a series of budgeted gift-giving. Breakfast in bed from Kanaya is met by a collection of vintage buttons and clasps from Vriska, which is countered by a gift certificate for the local coffee shop for those unpleasantly early morning jobs that keep cropping up. She retaliates with painstakingly crafted cocoa mix, a recipe she doesn't disclose the source of beyond "Family." 

The gifts get a little more thoughtful, over time, based off snippets of conversation. A pair of gloves with the fingers removed, for Vriska's biking adventures, or a few editions of some magazine with the latest styles. It was a bit unfair that Kanaya could make her gifts, whileas Vriska had to resort to being extra thoughtful (she had snuck in a pair of tickets to an old theatre that played black-and-white movies with a note that read "y/n?"), but the added unfair advantage made the challenge sweeter. She was nothing if not a winner, and this would be no exception. 

Kanaya's response to both the magazines and the theatre is a pair of matching, classic black dresses modeled after Audrey Hepburn's infamous role. She apologized for the lack of completely appropriate jewelry, to which Vriska rolled her eyes. 

"You just made me a dress you could have sold for some ludicrous amount, for the sole purpose of one date, and you're apologizing because the look is slightly off?" 

"Yes," was the stubborn reply. "Yes, I am." 

At this, Vriska cracks a smile. It's her favorite smile; the one that holds a secret and charms the world in a heartbeat. 

Kanaya didn't say a word against this being a date. 

They watch Casablanca in their impossibly fancy dresses, turning heads and causing enthusiastically whispered conversations wherever they go; their arms are linked as they walk, before that becomes impossibly awkward and uncomfortable. They opt for lacing their fingers together instead, and wield matching grins that share too much. The night is spent roaming and improvising cliched moonlight dances until they are forced to remember that walking around in equally fancy shoes for hours is not conducive to happy feet, and they are leaning on one another the whole way back with appropriately matching cringes. (It's a night for matching, it seems.) 

Nonetheless, Vriska steals a goodnight kiss before absconding to her room. Kanaya smiles for what feels like the millionth time that night, and wonders if that counted as a gift. She knows exactly how to return that one. 

\-- 

Vriska comes home with bruises and a split lip, once, and this is how Kanaya learns that the places she plays pool for cash are not always as nice as she has been led to believe. (To be specific, Vriska's hustling had apparently set off a few short fuses. This is also the first time Kanaya has heard of the hustling, and the gambling it apparently fuels, which does not help diffuse the situation at all.) 

She is angry, but more than that she is worried, and she fusses and fidgets over the wounds until she is shrugged off by an all-too-tense Vriska. Considering their budding relationship, this stings, but considering their friendship, it does more to calm her down than anything. 

She watches Vriska attend to her own wounds in heavy silence for a handful of minutes that feel too long, refusing to meet Kanaya's prying eyes. The woman before her is far too familiar with self-administered medical care for this to be a new development, and that strikes her as something she needs to investigate when she can. For now, she intervenes again and wraps a hand around one thin wrist; this time, she is not met with resistance. 

"It's okay," she murmurs, turning her around with her free hand. Vriska's arm becomes almost trapped between them, and she still doesn't look up from the empty space she stares at resolutely. "You can let me help you." 

Her jaw clenches, and she says nothing, but she doesn't move and Kanaya takes that as the only permission she's going to get. She takes up the first aid supplies. 

"I'm angry that you wouldn't tell me," she continues with a soft care, mercilessly beating away at the insistent silence, "and we're going to have a long talk about this. About the fighting, about the gambling, about everything." 

She dabs away at a cut on her forehead, mulling over her next words as long as she dares to. 

"But," Kanaya firmly tacks on, tapping at Vriska's down-turned chin with the inside of her middle knuckle so she knows that she should look up; she pauses at the utterly chagrined expression that blooms in response to meeting her gaze, and she is guilty despite herself. "I'm not going to leave because of this," she finishes, brushing back tangled and dirty hair with gentle fingers. 

At this, the tension seeps from too-tight shoulders; it's not drastic in the least, but it's enough for her to know that her words had some effect. 

Kanaya smiles, and she makes sure that it is the crooked one Vriska has come to believe means she is making a private joke. "At this point, I don't think I could leave at all. Your nefarious claws have sunk into my flesh and I won't be going anywhere." 

Vriska smiles back, sheepish, and while it's a tentative and uncertain thing - a rare look for her, but she supposes that everyone is allowed their moments of weakness - it's a start. 

"I do believe you owe me a story, however," Kanaya prods as she dabs away dutifully, ignoring the way her 'patient' begins to freeze up all over again, "as to how you became so ... proficient ... with taking care of yourself after such an event." 

There was a reason she had placed herself between the injured and the door, and she thinks that it was a wise choice if the reaction she gets is any indication. After a while, however, Vriska slouches with a peculiar variant of resignation - it's a little like a child, trying to make a chore their choice to do as opposed to an order they're following, which is strange because this is in fact completely her choice - and she actually sulks. 

"Fiiiiiiiine," she grumbles, and it's precious enough that Kanaya can't choke back her laughter fast enough. She gets a glare, but it has lost some of the fire she usually expects from the withering look. 

Later, she'll regret laughing. 

They stay up far too late with the story, bringing pillows to the couch and everything. (Vriska is mortified by the Sleepover feel of it, but Kanaya pushes her to continue anyway. She has Disney movies saved on her computer, and she is not afraid to use them.) One story becomes two, and they wind up with a full blown share-and-care on their hands. Vriska promises that she'll be more careful, and even though it's clear she won't - perhaps can't - fully stop her dangerous habits, she does completely mean to stick by the promise to be careful. She promises to be a better person in general, and it breaks Kanaya's heart a little to hear it in such a sad mumble. 

So she hits her with a pillow, and says that there'll be none of that at this Sleepover, and behind the affronted shock she can see a general understanding. It doesn't stop her from hitting her back with the same pillow, but they decide that an all out pillow beatdown would be a terrible idea given the breakables scattered everywhere. (Even if the cliched version is something that Vriska would not mind trying.) 

It's a good thing that it's a Friday ni-- er, Saturday morning, because Vriska falls asleep on her knees _somehow,_ and there's no way either of them are going to wake up before noon if they can help it. 

(They don't get up until 4pm. Kanaya is somewhat sad that she wasted her daylight, until Vriska sleepily clings to her when she tries to leave their couch-fort. Worth it.) 

Kanaya introduces Vriska to Rose that same weekend, and though the both of them actually make an effort to be polite upon request, it's all too easy to fall back on snark. The both of them have heard much of one another, and Vriska is very aware of the still-lingering awkwardness between the two classy dames. (A little too aware, actually; most of it is her imagination working overtime.) Kanaya has to intervene when the psychoanalyzing begins, but after that, the afternoon is relatively peaceful. 

"So, Rose, I hear you write about wizards." A sharp smile. "Inspired by Harry Potter?"  
An interested hum. "I do prefer more ... _classical_ literature, personally, but I don't expect you to have read much of it." Delicate sip of coffee. 

...relatively. 

There is something about the Strider-Lalonde duo that just will not get along with anyone without extra helpings of irony/sarcasm, and Vriska is far too headstrong to put up with it nicely. Although, Kanaya reflects, Vriska has trouble getting along with anyone at _all_... Terezi is the only friend she can recall, and even their relationship had been somewhat tainted with vitriol. 

It's really best to just keep group interactions to a minimum, she decides, even if all parties later claim to have enjoyed their company. 

(TT: So, how's life with Serket?  
TT: Has she left dead critters at your door yet?  
GA: No She Has Not But Thank You For Asking Dirk  
TT: Anytime.) 

The new stages of their relationship are surprisingly comfortable, all things said; it's a transition, and it's occasionally rocky, but the majority of their trials are related to their lives more than their partnership. They are tight on rent that month, mostly because of The Incident and the resulting lack of funding to supplement Vriska's slight gambling problem. She temporarily hangs up her pride and apologizes, repeatedly, until Kanaya is so sick of hearing her say "sorry" in ten different ways and three languages that she kisses her in sheer frustration and actually snaps that she isn't going to leave and to shut up. Vriska wrinkles her nose and says that she has the weirdest boner, and cackles like a maniac at the resulting expression on Kanaya's face. 

(It is surprising how open the prickly woman can be, when she is given a chance to demonstrate it. When she gives herself a chance to demonstrate it.) 

"But seriously," Vriska grins, "your bed or mine." 

Kanaya thinks on that, as well as the overall question. It doesn't take long. "Your room is a hazard to all who enter it," she decides. "So, mine." 

She is dragged away as soon as she says it, and she nearly stumbles as Vriska decides that the wall by her door is close enough and spins them around with a flourish. Her back hits the wall, and she is breathless even before she is caught between it and the enthusiastic mess of hair and lips and teeth. She gasps for air as Vriska makes a trail along her jaw, latching onto her neck and clawing at her sides. 

Kanaya intends to protest that this is horribly inefficient and much less comfortable than a bed would be. Really, she intends to do that. 

But, they're roughly the same height, and their hips fit together nicely, and after a moment of tangled legs and generally awkward re-positioning this becomes very apparent. All protests are out the window when Vriska rolls said hips forward and bites down, growling in a decidedly self-satisfied manner as Kanaya arches into it in response. 

Well then. 

Walls were nice too, she reasoned, grabbing fistfuls of Vriska's hair and yanking the woman back to kiss her again. She could feel her laugh into it in response. 

It wouldn't be the last time she decided that she was actually kind of okay with the spontaneous nature of their relationship. But, seriously, next time she insisted on using the bed. 

\-- 

It is a strange feeling, to realize that you're more or less complete. That you have been for a long time, and you just didn't notice it. Kanaya more or less settled into it, because she was just that kind of person... but for Vriska, the realization was less simple. 

For Vriska, it didn't really hit her until she was buying those special little dried fruit things Kanaya liked for the dozenth time. 

She stares at them as her world more or less turns on its head and runs around bleating like a goat. 

Good news had hit her just an hour ago. Kanaya had signed a deal with some company, which was great for her, because it meant she was actually going somewhere; she would produce a line for them over the summer, and she had been so giddy, and it was utterly hilarious to witness because childlike giddiness was so unnatural for someone normally so reserved. And it meant... 

...it meant there was something in the future to look forward to that wasn't next week's paycheck. Something that wasn't just a new movie coming out, or a lunch with Terezi where she could sound smarter than she was, because she'd been reading up on Law, and... 

And. 

And holy shit, they have a future, and she has never had a future before. 

Speaking of childlike, she belatedly realizes that there is some kid tugging at her pants leg and asking if she's about to die because she looks like she's about to die and that his daddy is a doctor down looking down aisle ten for paper towels-- 

Dully, she acknowledges the kid. She can't tell if it's a boy or a girl. 

"Um," she attempts to sound articulate, failing miserably from the moment the thought crosses her mind. She feels kind of detached from her own body, and hey, maybe she is dying from shock. That would be the perfect ending to her life story, wouldn't it? Dying right when things were looking up? 

She looks back at the package in her hands and laughs pathetically. 

"I'm in love with someone who isn't going to leave and I have a future and I don't know what to do about it." 

She looks down at the kid again, hoping that some random five year old has the answer to all of her problems. He or she looks so painfully serious as he or she contemplates it, too, and it's easier to wait and see and kind of quietly hope that she doesn't pass out right there in the store. 

"I think you should be happy," the kid says at least, proud of him or herself for coming up with an answer. He or she beams up at her. 

"I," Vriska stammers out, "I don't." She laughs again, because hey, what do you know, a random five year old has the answer to all of her problems, isn't that just fucking wonderful. 

Yes. Yes it is. 

"Thank you," she says to the kid, still too dazed to make sense of anything. She pats his or her head. "You're a cute kid, go find your doctor daddy." 

She pays for her groceries and walks home. Kanaya greets her from the couch, intently focused on whatever it is she's working on beneath the level of what could be seen from the door, and Vriska closes said door instead of slamming it for once. Blinking, Kanaya looks over curiously. 

Dead silence. 

"I love you," Vriska says, and it's stupid but whatever. As long as Kanaya keeps looking at her like that, she feels like an articulate genius with the most poetic prose in the whole world. "And I know I'm kind of a douchebag to your friends, sorry about that. But I want to be with you for forever. Because I'm in love with you." 

Kanaya opens her mouth, but remains speechless. 

Vriska stares back. 

"I think we can go to Africa or something and get ritualistically shaman-married," she blurts. "If you want to." 

"Yes," Kanaya replies immediately. "Yes I do." 

"Okay. But I think we're going to have to save up for plane tickets." 

"I don't care. I would love to be ritualistically shaman-married to you." 

"We're doing this," Vriska begins with a tiny smile. 

"We're making it happen," Kanaya finishes for her, smiling back. 

Perfect.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey so did anybody else like that Dirk/Jake I threw in there? 
> 
> ... 
> 
> Anybody?


	3. of Lockets and Scars

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Right so, pariahpirate requested that the locket mentioned play a specific song, and I'm just gonna say that it plays a shorter, more simplistic version but that it's basically the same melody. You know, what with music boxes not usually being that complex or long, and it being an antique. (You'll see.) 
> 
> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FeJLG2aOngM  
> ^the requested song
> 
> This is the final chapter of setup before we get to the meat of the story. I didn't want to spoil this, but I realized that it'd be a dick move to not put up a trigger warning. After the fluff of the last chapter, this is going to be a somewhat jarring change - it contains death and suicide, as well as other themes that might be uncomfortable. More notes at the end of the chapter.

The locket was so small and so buried that she had barely seen it. 

Kanaya pauses, in between the aisle of old treasures and the aisle of Uncle Joe's Garage Junk, attention caught by the glimmer in an otherwise dull pile of papers and books and letters of regret, and her fingers pick out the mildly tarnished chain. She opens the locket, expecting a portrait of a long-since-broken family, but what she hears is the metallic tinkle of a music box. It is soothing, and the scrawled insignia is the cursive M of the scorpio. She has never seen anything like it before. 

It was made with better days in mind, and Kanaya thinks that it belongs to the future. A symbol, she thinks, and she knows that Vriska needs to unwind - even within the calm, she expects a storm, and she doesn't know how to breathe through the moments she lets herself get out of control. 

She smiles; in short, it's perfect. She purchases it, asking for it to be carefully wrapped. Even the bag is picture-perfect, and it swings with her as she walks. 

Her smile doesn't leave the entire bus ride home, and only grows wider with pride as she is paid a compliment for her dress. There is a spring in her step as she walks the mile home. 

The man was so quiet and so shadowed that she had barely seen him. 

Kanaya pauses, alone in the twilight hours, attention caught by a glimmer that no one wants to see but everyone is familiar with. The kind of glimmer that you know from year one means Sharp and Dangerous. The kind of glimmer you know is a knife before you see it fully, and his shoulders are tense but dropped and he does not want to be here. 

His glasses are skewed, and he has better days in mind, the last vestiges of a careful dye job the only sign that he had not always been condemned to this life. Faded purple. She can see that his eyes are bloodshot from here, and she think sthat he has not slept well in a very long time. 

For a moment, she pities him, but he is demanding her purse and the knife is flashing and she fears for her life more than she cares about his. She hands it over, and he sees the wrapped bag; she knows what he thinks, that it is an expensive trinket - technically, it was expensive, but it is more important than it is valuable and she does not want to lose it when she just found it - and she knows he will demand it before he says another word. 

Instinctively, she draws back, nothing but the faintest show of resistance. She is not a fighter, but she is proud and that is a problem because he lurches for it in response. She panics, and so does he, and it's just a fraction of time but it's a moment that will scar her, a moment that will last. 

He drops the bloodied knife as if it had burned him, stumbles, his eyes are wide. He runs. He has made too many mistakes already and it is all he can think to do because it is all he has done for years. 

Run. Keep running. 

Kanaya is paralyzed for a handful of seconds, too long, and she cannot breathe well even after she can move. She has never even broken a bone, or needed stitches, and this is by far the most peculiar feeling she has ever experienced. 

She forces a breath, two; the world is a whole new place and for a moment she sees everything all too well. It fades to a fuzzy nothingness, dulled and obsolete, and she feels sick and wrong and terrible. She fingers her sleeve until it covers her hand, grabs the knife awkwardly, and delicately carries herself to the closest door. 

No one answers for a full five minutes, and she is counting the seconds unevenly but that is far too long regardless and if she stays she will die. 

It takes her three tries before she finds help, and by then she cannot feel her fingertips. The quiet walk home had been so peaceful before, but now it was a nightmare of hindsight and bloody clothes. The family is as helpful as they can be, panicking more than the woman who'd been stabbed, calling 911 and fumbling over what they should do to help. 

It is too much to focus on, and honestly she has lost too much blood to keep standing, so Kanaya collapses and breathlessly asks for a bag and the phone. Her knuckles are whiter than they should be around the handle of the knife, and it is hard to let go when your fingers are like numb sticks of lead. 

She dials Rose first, because she knows the number by heart after years and years of dialing it, and they have a reasonable conversation about what her assailant looked like; she slurs that she needs to call Vriska before she can't breathe at all anymore. Rose pauses - Kanaya suspects that she is gathering the ability to speak without fear - before giving a verbal acceptance and hanging up herself. 

Vriska is much less coordinated than Rose, but Kanaya passes out before she can get her to calm down. 

The ambulance arrives. Vriska misses it, but not the stricken family still standing by the street. 

She wages a war on the hospital staff almost immediately, and becomes a torrent of uncooperative desperation and fury when security is involved. They are halfway to using force when the Strider-Lalonde duo arrives to claim her as their responsibility and restrain her themselves. She still does not calm down, not until Rose slaps her across the face and shouts that interrupting the surgeons would kill her before it helped her. 

Vriska stands there, refusing to move her head from where it had jerked to. Her fingers clench, and she visibly fights off her rush of adrenaline enough to be something close to civilized. Dirk lets her go cautiously, and doesn't say a word. 

"You are not the only one who cares about Kanaya," Rose all but hisses, "but you are the only one who finds it necessary to act like an _animal._ Get ahold of yourself!" 

Vriska does not apologize, even as she crumples in on herself. When she finally shows her face, red and angry where Rose's palm had struck, she looks like a lost wreck and not at all the force of nature she strives to be. 

"How?" She finally asks, voice cracking. 

Rose softens, somewhat. 

"I don't know," she answers honestly. "However you can. But waging all out war on the people who are just trying to help is _not_ the appropriate response." She smirks, tight and poised. "Let's save that for revenge plots, shall we?" 

"I don't care about revenge right now," Vriska mumbles miserably, wholly defeated for the first time in years. "I want her to be okay." 

There isn't really anything to say to that, so they wait in silence. 

It takes over an hour for someone to speak with them, and it's Rose who goes to bear the news for better or for worse. Every ounce of grace leaves her in a single movement, one drop of proud shoulders, and it's this that speaks even louder than the man's carefully arranged expression of apologetic disclosure. He leaves, respectfully turning his gaze downwards, and Rose doesn't bother to move. 

Dirk takes a half step towards his sister, then stops. He is stuck between actions, locked up in unfamiliar uncertainty, and there is no way out. Vriska makes a sound, caught between the thousand things she doesn't know how to do, and when he looks at her it's almost worse than looking at the graceless Rose Lalonde. It's a fallen thing he sees, here, someone who could have been a titan reduced to meek desolation. This one blow was all it took to break her, and she has washed her hands of the will to get up. 

None of them recover very quickly, and it's a good long while before anyone finds any words at all. Rose finally turns to face them, assessing the situation with as much distance as possible. 

"Vriska," her voice wavers, "I would like for you to stay with us for the time being." 

Dull blue eyes stare, and it's hard to say if she hasn't heard a word or if she's waiting to hear the rest. 

"There are matters that need to be sorted out," Rose continues, clipping her words in the monumental attempt to regain control of herself, "and I think that it is best if it's handled with all of us on the same page." 

She refuses to blink, rigid and contained, as she waits for a response. Vriska finally seems to process the request, and sluggishly looks from sister to brother and back again. There are twenty things she could have said, fifteen because Kanaya wouldn't approve of those, ten because they were all wrong, five because it wasn't worth it... 

"Okay," she rasps out, flat and soft and lifeless and she is gone, she is gone and she is not coming back. 

The investigation is short lived, lasting days at the most. One Eridan Ampora turns himself in, reported to be "terrified" and "incoherent" and it seems as if the processing is faster and easier than it ever has been in the past. He is sentenced to life in prison and he does not make bail. 

In short, the full wrath of the Lalondes rained down, with assistance from Serket and Strider. Kanaya may not have known it, entirely, but her connections were powerful and there is a reason that her murderer was terrified. 

After that, there's nothing to do but mourn, and no one is very good at that. 

\-- 

Rose does not cry at the funeral, but two weeks go by after that and she is weeping into her brother's shoulder. She cannot remember a time in her life that she has cried this hard, and the times that tears fell at all were few and far between, and it is totally undignified and messy and not at all like her. 

He pets her head, fingers occasionally threading into her hair, and he doesn't make a sound until she begins to calm down. The process lasted barely two minutes, in a quiet hall of the house with no one else to hear. She had seen him, and everything had just been wrong, and now here they were, sprawled on the floor in a tangle of spontaneous grief. 

"I was wondering how long this would take," he breathes into her hair, and for once it doesn't feel like a joke at her expense. It might still be, but she doesn't have it in her to care. 

"I was hoping it wouldn't have happened at all," she admits. A bit of spite rushes in to fill the empty space her emotions had left behind, and even if her voice is polite her intent is not. "You seem to be doing just fine." 

He is silent, still smoothing her hair with his hand, but he looks down at her and at this angle she can see the hint of amber-orange, brighter than she remembers. 

"She was your best friend," he says at last, "not mine." A pause, because it feels like a half-truth and he knows it. "But," he allows, exhaling and now is not the time for the usual antics even if he wants it to be. "I wouldn't show it if I wasn't doing just fine, would I?" 

She lets this go, but tucks her head down to rest on his now-wrinkled and quite soaked shirt. 

"It isn't fair." 

"So says the spoiled princess." 

"She says it to the softy prince." 

"Touche," he says, and he smiles a crooked smile. 

\-- 

Vriska gets a new roommate. It was decided that she and Rose would split Kanaya's things accoringly, and her own room is overflowing with the stuff. The locket, turned in by Ampora, hangs around her neck - she only takes it off to shower, and plays it over and over again. She falls asleep to the sound, night after night, and she only sleeps well when she dreams that Kanaya is there to hear it. Those mornings are the most painful. 

She nearly lost her job, taking too much time off and arriving late more often than she cared to find out. 

Her new roommate is a quiet, shy boy in a wheelchair - the apartment was disabled friendly, which is what attracted him to looking at it to begin with - and she can't help but pick on him, because she is angry and bitter and alone. He asks her about the locket on the first day, and she snidely asks him about his legs. 

He doesn't ask her about it again, but that only makes her angrier because she knows that he knows. 

She had, in fact, cried at the funeral. She had cried and she hadn't given a fuck, shoving off anyone who tried to comfort her. Terezi had persisted, because she knew too much and she didn't care if Vriska was a bitch. It was kind of nice, but she had been too busy doing the normal thing and _mourning_ the death of ... 

... 

Life, as Vriska knew it, could be a bitch. 

Tavros never stands up to her when she makes a biting comment, and she kind of hates that. She doesn't talk to Lalonde or Strider these days, but she knows that even now they'd have a quip ready for anything, and she isn't sure if he's just being nice or if he's being a meek little mouse. It's pretty clear he's used to being stepped on by other people. She wants him to stand up to her, and she says as much except in the more literal sense, and he just looks at her like he's sorry. 

She really does lose her job, then, because she's at the end of her rope and she doesn't care and she snaps at Tavros before knocking over his chair and storming out. She calls Terezi, leaves a voicemail, calls Lalonde and gets psychoanalyzed, hangs up in the middle of it, calls Jake and his number's disconnected. She calls Strider, then hangs up before he can answer. He would have been a douche anyway. She almost tries to call Kanaya, to see what happens. 

She stays out. She walks for hours, heads to the shittiest bar in walking distance when her feet get sore. Gets drunk, plays pool, gets punched in the face but who gives a fuck because she smashed his into the table and there was _glass_ there, motherfucker, what now. Gets thrown out. 

She sits in an alleyway and plays the musical locket over and over. It rains, and she tucks it into her shirt and huddles up under the edge of the roof, sticking out like it knew someone was gonna be an idiot someday. It's a bad one, it seems, thunder and lightning and the whole deal. 

Terezi calls back. She's worried. Vriska does not care. She's not sure she can care about anything, and she says as much, and Terezi offers to come meet her but she says no, fuck that, she doesn't want to see anybody right now. 

Her hands shake. 

"I can't do this, 'rezi," and she hangs up, because she doesn't want to hear what Terezi has to say about blueberries or anything, and she's kind of guilty for being a bitch to the only person left that she gives a flying fuck about... but Terezi has other friends, maybe. 

Vriska is a mess, and she's tired of dealing with any of this. She plays the locket when the rain stops, over and over. 

Over and over. 

She breaks, then, again. She can't keep it in anymore, because there's nothing. Nothing is alright, nothing is going to be alright, and she just _can't_ , just can't, it wasn't fair, she was doing so well. 

She was a mile from home, a fucking mile away, and Vriska should have been walking her home every day except that seemed so stupid at the time but it didn't now. She was gone, and she wasn't coming back, and there was just so much wrong with that because she didn't deserve it. 

_And I can't take it._

Yeah. Yeah, okay. 

Vriska walks home, spent and empty and broken down; Tav has a bunch of pain meds for his back, since his nerves are all fucked up, and she has some old whiskey stored for special occasions. Seems good enough. Lot of messy ways to do it, but she's way too tired to bother. Tavros asks her what she's doing, panics, but she's better than he is because he's still not used to the chair yet and she's been dancing around people like a ninja since her first fight with the dumbshit at the home. 

She ditches him then, goes walking again, and she's pretty sure he's calling somebody for her but it's going to be too little too late. She avoids the main roads, avoids everyone she can, and she keeps going until she starts to feel it. She's tired, but she's hot and sick too, and that wasn't exactly part of the plan but she's not about to turn back now. 

It's a little while before she can't stand, and she throws up in the grass and barely avoids landing in it when she collapses. All in all, it's not nearly as easy as she would have liked it to be, but she is past caring and she has been past caring for a long time now. She's honestly surprised that she hasn't done this sooner, and she embraces it because it means she's dying and that's good enough. 

Vriska pats herself on the back for her follow-through, plays the locket one more time, and lets the darkness claim her. 

She doesn't wake up.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay so I want to set the record straight here. I do not condone suicide, and if you or someone you know is thinking about it, then please get help. You aren't in this alone, and hell, even if you think you are, go meet someone new. Do something fun and stupid. Dance in the middle of the super market when your favorite songs come on. Give yourself a chance. What happened here is very rare, and I STILL don't condone the events that occurred. In this story, Vriska grew up with a rough life, and she never had a whole lot; she fell into a very powerful romance that became the only thing that really mattered to her. Even her own survival, which is what she fought for her whole life, ceased to matter when she lost that because she realized that, to her, it wasn't worth it without that relationship. Kanaya was her stabilization, in a lot of ways, and she became a sort of midline to compare EVERYTHING to. "Is this as awesome as Kanaya, yes/no," and most of the time the answer was no, or, "only if I get to share it WITH Kanaya." That would have been fine, but before she had even fully adjusted to THAT, Kanaya was lost and the guiding force of Vriska's life was gone. Because she was so closed off from everyone, no one could stop her from doing this; Terezi tried, Tavros tried, but neither were equipped to handle it. Honestly, Rose tried to handle it as well, and she most likely called around and sought professional help out of a distant concern, but even that wasn't enough. I fully believe that, had Rose been talking to Vriska more than she was (after the initial period of grief where she was not the all-seeing wannabe therapist that she usually is), she would have seen it coming and she would have done more. She would have been able to do more. 
> 
> But, all in all, events conspired and Vriska killed herself. It happens. It sucks, but it happens. 
> 
> And that's that.


End file.
